Pryor to Politico: Arkansas Democrats aren't dead yet

Politico has a profile up on U.S. Sen. Mark Pryor, the lone Democrat standing in the Arkansas congressional delegation in a state with a demonstrated antipathy toward President Obama.

You won't find Pryor speaking highly of Obama in the Arkansas context — he "doesn't connect well," said Pryor — but he will stand up for Democrats.

“The Democratic Party, it’s not dead like some people think it is.”

Pryor predicted a gubernatorial win for Mike Ross, the possibility of regaining seats in Congress and an even brighter outlook in 2016 if Hillary Clinton leads the ticket. He also continues to emphasize the positives of health care reform.

“I think that President Obama has in some ways what you would think of as a hard-left agenda in various ways, and that agenda is not popular in our state,” Pryor said, riding in the backseat of an aide’s pickup. “And a lot of that agenda I don’t support.”

But Pryor is not backing away from areas of the president’s agenda that he does support, even as polls show the senator’s support takes a hit once voters know he backs Obamacare.

“It has been a success,” Pryor says of Obamacare, citing a number of health insurance reforms and other benefits taking effect. “Probably we did get 80 percent [right], we have to go in and work on the 20 percent.”